How A Diss During A Hearing Led To A Breakthrough Bipartisan Ethics Bill
WASHINGTON — During a hearing in March, Rep. Katie Porter (D-Calif.) told House Oversight Committee chair James Comer (R-Ky.) that his impeachment inquiry against President Joe Biden had been a bust.
“The American people, regardless of party, should know that an investigation was conducted into whether Joe Biden did anything wrong,” Porter said. “We followed the evidence to where it led: a dead end. So this impeachment inquiry should end today.”
It wasn’t a particularly new sentiment. Many Democrats had already declared the impeachment inquiry over. But Porter’s remarks took a turn: She said the committee should work in a bipartisan manner to crack down on influence peddling by politicians — and Comer responded.
“Ms. Porter, I think you are sincere, and I look forward to working with you on that legislation,” Comer said.
Neither lawmaker said another word about it — until last week, when they unveiled the Presidential Ethics Reform Act, a bill that, among other things, would require presidents and vice presidents to disclose payments and gifts from foreign sources made within two years of entering or exiting public office.
Ethics rules already require the president and vice president to put out annual statements detailing their income, assets and liabilities; the new bill would expand the requirements to family members, and it would cover loans like the ones Joe Biden extended to his brother and son — a major talking point in Republicans’ impeachment inquiry.
“So we’re talking about siblings, parents, sister and brother-in-laws,” Porter said on CNN. “We’ve seen more presidents involve their adult children, involve their family, and we think that’s likely to continue in the future.”
Former president Donald Trump gave his daughter Ivanka and son-in-law Jared Kushner roles in his administration, and Kushner then struck an enormous payday with the Saudi government after having overseen favorable policy toward Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
The draft bill specifies that a son-in-law would be covered by the new reporting requirements, though it’s not clear if payments to a company rather than to the individual family member would be covered. Another provision affecting Trump would require disclosure of his tax returns, an unofficial presidential tradition that he’s always refused to follow.
The legislation represents a surprising collaboration — not only because Comer has led the Republican impeachment inquiry against Biden, but because the oversight committee has been the scene of some of the nastiest partisan brawling in Congress over the past two years. The latest example of the bad blood: Texas Democratic Rep. Jasmine Crockett’s “bad-built butch body” comment about Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) earlier this month., after the Georgia Republican made mocked Crockett’s eyelashes.
For Comer, the legislation is an outgrowth of his pursuit of corruption allegations against Biden. He’s used his subpoena power to document the president’s son’s receipt of several million dollars from foreign nationals, but not shown that the president himself had anything to do with his son’s overseas business dealings.
For Porter, the bill builds on her reputation as a proponent of ethics in government. She has previously advocated for a stock trading ban for members of Congress, and earlier this year based her ill-fated bid for an open California Senate seat partly on a good-government agenda that called for banning lobbyists from making campaign contributions.
The Comer-Porter pairing won the bill a lot of media attention, but so far it lacks cosponsors. Republicans have been quiet about the legislation, while Democrats have been passive-aggressive, with the oversight committee’s top Democrat, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), introducing a rival ethics bill specifically targeting Trump’s receipt of millions from foreign governments during his presidency.
The White House doesn’t like the Comer-Porter bill, either. Spokesman Ian Sams told reporters that the administration is “always happy to look at Congressman Comer’s bright ideas,” but that Biden has already released 26 years of his tax returns and has been a model of ethics.
It seems unlikely the presidential ethics bill could become law this year. Asked if it would get a committee hearing, Comer said it needed airtime first, explaining that he and Porter were doing TV interviews to publicize it. They’ve “got to explain it to people,” Comer told HuffPost.
When she proposed the committee work on an influence peddling bill during that hearing in March, Porter said they should consult with good-government groups such as Common Cause, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington and Public Citizen. Those organizations said they were not consulted on the proposal but offered mild praise for the draft bill.
“It should have a stronger enforcement mechanism, but it’s excellent for a disclosure law,” Public Citizen’s Craig Holman said in an interview.
The legislation offers no criminal penalties for failing to comply with its requirements, a shortcoming noted by Holman and others.
“I’m not sure why the members pursued this process in this way, but I think the bill has some strengths, but also a number of places where it could be strengthened significantly,” said Donald Sherman, executive vice president and chief counsel at CREW, noting that the covered period for disclosures could be longer.
Aaron Scherb, senior director of legislative affairs at Common Cause, said elements of the bill resembled elements of other bills Common Cause has supported, such as the For the People Act, a sweeping ethics package that Democrats pushed through the House in 2021. (Rather than merely demand disclosure, that bill would require presidents to divest from assets that present conflicts of interest.)
“These are not pulled out of a hat,” Scherb said. “So I think this language, at first glance, seems to be a step in the right direction.”
